Supreme Court Legalizes Marriage Equality Nationwide

In a landmark 5-4 decision announced Friday, the Supreme Court ruled that gay couples nationwide have a right to marry as provided by the US Constitution. Conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy, who was the deciding vote, wrote the opinion for the court and stated that it was the wish for gay Americans:

“not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right.”

Justice Antonin Scalia wrote a scathing dissent of the court’s opinion and railed against his perceived judicial overreach. Scalia wrote in his dissent “The Supreme Court of the United States has descended from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie.”

Public reactions came in swiftly from around the country and Twitter was flooded with reactions both positive and negative.